Shortlisted for Children's Travel Book of the Year, Edward Stanford Travel Writing Awards 2023 On this quest around the world, you will discover lost kingdoms, phantom islands, and even legendary continents once sought by explorers but now believed to be mythical. For centuries, people have dreamed of finding the lost worlds of Atlantis, El Dorado, and the Seven Cities of Gold. As well as shedding light on these famously elusive places, this atlas contains maps and captivating illustrations to illuminate lesser-known destinations, from the lost island of Hy-Brasil to the desert city of Zerzura. You will learn about rich mythologies from different cultures, from the Aztecs to the ancient Britons, from the Greek legends to Japanese folklore. Most of the places in this book have never been found, but within these pages you will succeed where the adventurers of the past were thwarted. Learn about ancient maps, age-old manuscripts, and cryptic carvings that reveal clues to the whereabouts of these lost kingdoms. The journey will transport you to thoroughly other-worldly places. From Emily Hawkins—New York Times bestselling author of Oceanology—comes this whimsical blend of myth and history, fact and fantasy. This lavish volume will fire the imaginations of young adventurers everywhere.

An Atlas of Lost Kingdoms takes young explorers on a quest to discover legendary lost worlds from a variety of different cultures spanning the globe.

An Atlas of Lost Kingdoms takes young explorers on a quest to discover legendary lost worlds from a variety of different cultures spanning the globe.

From a preeminent scholar of Eastern Europe and the prizewinning author of Chernobyl, the essential history of Russian imperialism. In 2014, Russia annexed the Crimea and attempted to seize a portion of Ukraine -- only the latest iteration of a centuries-long effort to expand Russian boundaries and create a pan-Russian nation. In Lost Kingdom, award-winning historian Serhii Plokhy argues that we can only understand the confluence of Russian imperialism and nationalism today by delving into the nation's history. Spanning over 500 years, from the end of the Mongol rule to the present day, Plokhy shows how leaders from Ivan the Terrible to Joseph Stalin to Vladimir Putin exploited existing forms of identity, warfare, and territorial expansion to achieve imperial supremacy. An authoritative and masterful account of Russian nationalism, Lost Kingdom chronicles the story behind Russia's belligerent empire-building quest.

'Brisk and thoughtful, this book could hardly be more timely' Dominic Sandbrook, BBC History Magazine, Books of the Year From a preeminent scholar of Eastern Europe and the prize-winning author of Chernobyl, the essential history of Russian imperialism In 2014, Russia annexed Crimea and attempted to seize a portion of Ukraine. While the world watched in outrage, this violation of national sovereignty was in fact only the latest iteration of a centuries-long effort to expand Russian boundaries and create a pan-Russian nation. In Lost Kingdom, award-winning historian Serhii Plokhy argues that we can only understand the merging of imperialism and nationalism in Russia today by delving into its history. Spanning over two thousand years, from the end of the Mongol rule to the present day, Plokhy shows how leaders from Ivan the Terrible to Joseph Stalin to Vladimir Putin have exploited existing forms of identity, warfare and territorial expansion to achieve imperial supremacy. A strikingly ambitious book, Lost Kingdom chronicles the long and belligerent history of Russia's empire and nation-building quest.

"Prisoners of Geography meets Bill Bryson: a funny, fascinating, beautifully illustrated—and timely—history of countries that, for myriad and often ludicrous reasons, no longer exist. “Countries are just daft stories we tell each other. They’re all equally implausible once you get up close.” Countries die. Sometimes it’s murder, sometimes it’s by accident, and sometimes it’s because they were so ludicrous they didn’t deserve to exist in the first place. Occasionally they explode violently. A few slip away almost unnoticed. Often the cause of death is either “got too greedy” or “Napoleon turned up.” Now and then they just hold a referendum and vote themselves out of existence. This is an atlas of 48 nations that fell off the map. The polite way of writing an obituary is: dwell on the good bits, gloss over the embarrassing stuff. This book refuses to do so, because these dead nations are so full of schemers, racists, and con men that it’s impossible to skip the embarrassing stuff. Because of this – and because treating nation-states with too much reverence is the entire problem with pretty much everything – these accounts are not concerned with adding to the earnest flag saluting in the world, however nice some of the flags might be."

From the author of Apocalyptic Planet comes a vivid travelogue through prehistory, that traces the arrival of the first people in North America at least twenty thousand years ago and the artifacts that tell of their lives and fates. In Atlas of a Lost World, Craig Childs upends our notions of where these people came from and who they were. How they got here, persevered, and ultimately thrived is a story that resonates from the Pleistocene to our modern era. The lower sea levels of the Ice Age exposed a vast land bridge between Asia and North America, but the land bridge was not the only way across. Different people arrived from different directions, and not all at the same time. The first explorers of the New World were few, their encampments fleeting. The continent they reached had no people but was inhabited by megafauna—mastodons, giant bears, mammoths, saber-toothed cats, five-hundred-pound panthers, enormous bison, and sloths that stood one story tall. The first people were hunters—Paleolithic spear points are still encrusted with the proteins of their prey—but they were wildly outnumbered and many would themselves have been prey to the much larger animals. Atlas of a Lost World chronicles the last millennia of the Ice Age, the violent oscillations and retreat of glaciers, the clues and traces that document the first encounters of early humans, and the animals whose presence governed the humans’ chances for survival. A blend of science and personal narrative reveals how much has changed since the time of mammoth hunters, and how little. Across unexplored landscapes yet to be peopled, readers will see the Ice Age, and their own age, in a whole new light.